Called down from the Mountains, Written in the Sea
by Hazzapixie01
Summary: Clarke is a mountain, heart covered in ice to stop it from breaking, but can Bellamy, the history buff and part time researcher, teach her what it really means to love? Wow that sounds lame, fic title based off an artwork I had the pleasure of seeing and it inspired me to write my first Bellark fic.
1. Where the mountains meet the waves

**This is my first 100 story, and it's been a while since I've written (I advise you not to read my others until I can fix them up urg). As I said, I was inspired by a beautiful painting I saw and I'm going to try give it credit with this story. I don't know if my summary really conveyed my story, but it's a university AU with Clarke as a moody artist who doesn't want to be hurt by love, and then there is Bellamy.**

 **This is going to be pretty short, hopefully only 2 or 3 chapters long. Have fun reading :)**

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If there was one thing that Clarke knew, it was that if you were going to love someone, you better start on a breastplate and gauntlets for your heart, because without armour you're in for one hell of a war.

Raven had always referred to this armour as freezing her sparkplug, which is why at every opportunity she attempted to get Clarke to open up and dance with more, but the pandora box that held Clarke's love remained closed. And hence Raven was off partying at the club with another man and Clarke was sitting in the back row of the uni theatre watching a cheap viewing of 'Clash of the Titans' and gorging herself on a value box of popcorn. She pretended to be engaged in the dramatic and frustratingly over-acted fight scenes, and secretly appreciated some of the filmic techniques used. Her semester doing film studies had ruined her ability to watch a movie without analysing it in her head.

When the credits finally started rolling Clarke stood and grabbed her bag, glancing back at her seat a minimum of three times to check that she hadn't forgotten anything, a habit she picked up after leaving her phone at a restaurant for the second time. Clarke made her way out of the theatre but was blocked as she attempted to leave by a congregation of chatting boys standing in the middle of the doorway.

"That was the coolest movie!" one of them exclaimed to his friends, as Clarke tried to push past them.

"Nah, Jackson," said a deep voice from the corner of the group, and as the rest of the group quieted to hear his argument Clarke edged around, getting closer to the voice.

"It was soo historically inaccurate," the voice continued, and his friends groaned. Apparently this type of complaint was common for the boy that Clarke was now getting a glimpse of. His longish darkish ragged hair reminded her of Finn, and she shuddered at the memory, but hot _damn_ he was smokin'.

The dark hair boy extended his argument, "Those myths were incredibly erroneous," Wow, thought Clarke, who slips those kind of words into a sentence, "and don't even get me started on the fighting style. The way those supposedly Greek soldiers were swinging those swords was so wrong."

Just as Clarke was past the blockade, the history buff, as he obviously was, decided to demonstrate the correct style of warfare, and Clarke suddenly found herself acquainted with his hand as her drew it back and

 _ **THWACK**_

Bellamy looked at his hand in mortification at what he had done, and hurried to help up the victim of his super awesome but obviously slightly dangerous exposé of Greek sword fighting. The blonde on the floor looked dazed, undoubtedly in as much pain as his hand was.

"Oh my gosh, I am so sorry," he stammered as he attempted to get her off the coke and popcorn stained carpet. Blue eyes glared at the offending hand as she pushed herself off the ground with her own strength.

"What the hell man?" The girl cursed, and if looks could kill those blue eyes would be stabbing him in the chest. His friends looked on in morbid fascination at the encounter, Jasper crunching on the remains of his movie snacks with glee from the sidelines. Bellamy flinched at her insistent scowl, and tried to ignore how cute it made her look as he tried once again to apologise.

"Are you okay?"

The blonde ignored his question as she busied herself wiping the crumbs from her paint splattered jeans and reached down to pick up her purse, lying forlorn where she had dropped it. Bellamy beat her to it though, and offered the handbag tenderly, worried that she was going to strike out like a feral cat (because those azure eyes were starting to go a little savage).

"I'm Bellamy by the way," he says as she grabs her bag, and offers his hand in greeting. He hopes that maybe this way he can get away from the incident with minimal scratches. Although Bellamy doesn't expect the girl to respond, she looks up at him through her hair, messed from the fall, and shakes his hand.

"Clarke. But don't think this is forgiven. Keep your flailing for more wide open spaces next time."

As Clarke turns and exits the theatre Jackson lets out a low whistle through his teeth.

"Damn man," he calls to Bellamy, punching him good-naturedly in the arm, "I'd call her drop-dead gorgeous, but it seems that may be a sore point."

Bellamy had to agree with his friend, the blonde had the vicious, uptight thing going for her. And those smokin' eyes. Man. Eye's like those were his weakness. They reminded him of a Diwata. A good comparison to the girl in many ways, it seemed.

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 **So there is the first chapter, I hope it was okay. Don't be freaked out if it is extended on you, it's still in the works. Constructive criticism is always welcome and I may be in need of a Beta. Thank you so much for reading :) Those wondering, a Diwata is a Philippinene dryad.**

 **\- Hazmatilda**


	2. The Tempest and the Calm

**So chapter 2.. This story has been on my mind all weekend so I just had to sit down and finish the second chapter. Don't expect the chapter's to be posted so quickly in the future. I have posted a link to the artwork this story is based off on my profile, so feel free to check it out. Thankyou for the favourites and follows, they were an unexpected surprise :) Read my darlings...**

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It had been a week since the 'theatre incident' as Bellamy had dubbed it, and Clarke was still on his mind.

Monday morning greeted him by blinding the boy with sunlight streaming through the open curtains. He struggled with the thin sheets on his bed and prepared for his early morning ancient history lecture. As he drove down to campus, Bellamy stopped by the Ark to pick up his morning coffee, then he was set for the day. Bellamy sipped the steaming black drink and could feel his body filling with warmth. The scent of ground beans comforted him and his body went into autopilot as a memory of his mother and kid sister washed over him. It had been a long time since his mother had died, but he still remembered his mother's morning rituals of coffee and cake. Unfortunately Bellamy had yet to find a cafe with cake that he actually liked, so coffee would have to suffice.

As he walked down to his class, Bellamy marveled at the new art display on the wall. There were at least 10 canvases, each with a figure of some kind. The first one he passed featured an old man, except he was smudged with different colours, his wrinkles brought to life and somehow working to make the man seem much younger than he obviously was. Another featured a painting so life like he thought it was a picture at first. But no, here and there there was evidence of paint strokes. It was a woman, staring at the viewer, clothed in a black and yellow shirt, emanating a strength that could only exist because of some hardship. The texture in the eyes was so real Bellamy expected tears to flow onto the canvas. And then he saw it, his favourite. It was a close up of a face, but in profile, and all in shades of blue and black. The girl, for that is who the face belonged to, was staring at something in the distance, with a look of intense desire. It was like she was frozen, never able to reach what she yearned for. The most peculiar thing was though, he recognised the face. It couldn't be right though, so he looked down at the card on the wall beside the picture and his suspicions were confirmed.

 _Self Portrait_

 _Clarke Griffin_

 _Clarke Griffin_ , Bellamy thought to himself, _not a diwata then, but a griffin._

xxx

On the day the portraits were being revealed Raven had to practically drag Clarke out of bed. Part of Clarke still regretted allowing her painting to be seen in the public eye. The professor was one thing, but she had put her soul into the art (however cliché that seems), and it was far too private for the world to lay their judging eyes upon. It was extra credit though, which outweighed any reservations she held.

2nd year uni had taken away any ambition to dress up for class every day, so after her shower all she pulled on was her favourite sloppy-joe (Harvard - it had been her father's) and her usual jeans. The loose denim had a few new blue splotches here and there from her recent work, and Clarke deemed them as fondly as the dents in her rusted Holden.

Raven and Clarke part ways after breakfast, with a few short words of farewell. Her best friend didn't have a lecture until that afternoon and was working at the local garage part time before then. Clarke watched as her friend walked off into the distance before pulling away from the curb in front of their apartment block and drove down the road to campus. She avoided the history block upon arriving, choosing instead to take the longer way and evade where the paintings were hanging. Clarke slid into a seat up the back of her acrylics class just as the elderly professor began to talk. The blonde beside her offered a smile in greeting, but he let his face fall as Clarke ignored him. They had moved on from the portrait section in the course, and Professor Kane was excited to introduce them to abstract art. The professor's spanish accent became stronger as she spoke, and several people exchanged knowing looks, a sign that she was talking about her passion. The other give-away was her over-extended gesticulations. At one point Prof. Kane managed to knock over the computer stand, the sharp crash echoing through the lecture hall as she explained the use of colours, shapes, and line in the artstyle instead of focussing on realism.

The lecture went by quickly and as Clarke was packing up her notebook the boy beside her tried to start a conversation.

"Soo," he drawled with a texan accent, "Do you like the topic?"

"It's fine."

The boy tried to continue the stilted conversation despite Clarke's obvious disinterest.

"What are you doing after class?" There was an eager undertone in his voice, and Clarke had to stop herself from rolling her eyes in disgust.

"Doing something more interesting than talking to you." She finished packing her satchel and left the room, leaving a confused and slightly hurt texan in her icy wake.

Clarke couldn't get out of the room quick enough. Her mind knew that the boy wasn't anything like Finn, he had the wrong hair and the wrong accent, the wrong everything. But there was something about his smile that left her seething, with pain yeah, but mostly anger, a fire she was trying to freeze and leave on top of Mt. Everest. Because that's where she wished he was, instead of living up the life in California with a new girlfriend. She just wished that poor victim would get out soon, before she learnt what type of man Finn really was.

xxxx

Bellamy didn't know what was wrong with him. It was probably because she didn't fall at his feet when they first met, but he still couldn't keep that Griffin out of his head. Leather squeaked beneath him as he shifted in his chair, and Bellamy tired to concentrate on the ancient tome on the desk in front of his and not on the blue eyes of the mysterious artist Diwata. The musty air of the archive room pressed down upon him, and Bellamy decided to go up several levels to the small cafe at the museum he worked at part lime as a researcher.

He brought his laptop with him and soon he sat at a corner table tapping at the document he was working on, a cup of coffee sitting beside him.

He was soon distracted again, and instead of looking up the significance of symbols in the roman army ranking system, he found himself typing 'Clarke Griffin' into the search engine. Bellamy trawled through several facebook profiles before he found her, fully aware of how creepy it seemed, and discovered an artwork in an ameture art exhibition at the gallery.

A small cough tore Bellamy from his google stalking, and he looked up to see a girl standing in front of him . She was tall, with olive skin and long dark hair, although it was the car grease covering her clothes that drew his eyes.

"Mmmmm?" he prompted, and the girl gestured to her bag.

"I need to run to the bathroom, and there is no one else around," she said as she motioned the empty cafe, "would you mind minding my stuff?"

He promised her he look after it and put the stuff beside him before turning back to his computer screen. After deciding that enough was enough, Bellamy attempted to get the girl out of his mind and flicked back to his research task.

The girl was back before he knew it, but instead of leaving to go to another table like he expected, she sat down in the spare chair opposite him and waved down the waitress for a coffee and a slice of chocolate cake. He stared at her expectantly for an answer but the girl just shrugged and waited until her order came before introducing herself.

"I'm Raven, and you looked like you needed someone to talk to," she said in way of explanation, before digging into some cake. She offered him some and she laughed.

"You're just like my friend, she can't stand cake from anywhere unless it's her oven. I always tell her she is such a baked goods snob."

Bellamy finally introduced himself and they fell into easy conversation. Apparently she went to the same uni as him, studying mechanical engineering. That explained the oil. As they were chatting, Raven revealed that her food snob friend was in an exhibition on the weekend, obviously the same one that Clarke was in, and he agreed on the basis of friends. When Raven left they exchanged numbers and Bellamy travelled back into the pits of the museum, to get back to work.

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 **I'm sorry Clarke and Bellamy haven't met again yet, they will next chapter I promise.**

 **The paintings that I mentioned are real ones, the first one was painted by Bruno Jean Grasswill and is titled 'Michael Caton', the second was is painted by Angus McDonald and is titled 'Romanticide - portrait of Abbe May'. They were both part of the Archibald portrait competition this year. Clarke's painting is also based off a portrait, and is linked on my profile.**

 **Thankyou for reading, and remember criticism is always welcomed.**

 **\- Hazmatilda**


	3. The Ice Caps are Melting

**Sorry it took me so long, I started this fic in the middle of exam time so i've been studying like hell for most of the time. I hope you enjoy the next chapter :)**

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Baking had always been her release, besides painting of course. Whenever she felt stressed or depressed, she would always preheat her oven and start whipping some eggs into soft peaks. This is what she was doing when Raven finally walked in the door. Her friend flopped onto the couch with a smile on her face and Clarke set down a plate of cookies that she had just made.

"Have you decided which artwork to put in the exhibition yet?" Raven asked as she started on the plate, picking up a crumbling choc-chip cookie and savouring the melted chocolate hitting her tongue.

Clarke just grumbled and began to measure flour into a large glass bowl.

"I'll take that as a no then."

Clarke couldn't decide between two works that she was proud of, and she needed to get it to the gallery that evening - which was why she was cooking instead of in her art studio flipping a coin. Raven wittered about her day as Clarke baked, telling Clarke all about her the annoying apprentice at the garage and the cute guy she had met at the museum cafe.

Raven finally pushed her into the studio to pick a painting and promised to make dinner, kicking the door shut behind her as she left. Clarke looked around the room at the scattered canvases before her eyes landed on the two sitting on the desk next to each other, almost stark opposites.

'The Defender', a mainly white canvas featuring a pair of brown eyes overlaying splashes of black was a good one, she liked the detailing in the eyes and the fury it held, but she didn't think it would sit well in a gallery. Clarke's gaze drifted to the painting beside 'The Defender' and something tweaked in her heart. It was decided then, that was the painting to go in the exhibition.

xxx

Bellamy met Raven at the entrance to the gallery the next day. Her head was tilted up, marvelling at the architecture of the building. Bellamy himself paused, much like Raven, to admire the marble arch and delicately engraved artwork bordering the double doors. His mind drifted to a memory where he stood, quite similar to how he was now, standing in awe at a temple in India that he had visited on a study tour of ancient India. There he had marvelled at the carvings that spoke stories of heros and gods, on which India's history and culture stood. A gust of wind brought Bellamy back to the present, and he touched Raven's shoulder, intending to alert her of his presence. She jerked to attention, turning and greeting him with a hug.

"I'm glad you could make it!"

When he asked Raven where her artist friend was, she informed him her friend was already inside.

"She wanted to make sure everything was okay." She said in way of explanation.

They headed through the doors side by side, and walked towards the reception desk to buy tickets. Bellamy handed over the money and wandered into the exhibition, Raven still by his side.

There was already a fair amount of people in the door, admiring the artworks. Raven disappeared into the crowd of people and Bellamy worked his way around the room, stopping at each new work of art to read the plaques. There was apparently no theme for that year, so each work was completely different, and Bellamy was blown away by the variety. The skill was incredible as well, and Bellamy was surprised at the quality of work the so called 'amateurs' could produce.

He wandered a little more before he came to one painting that made him stop in his tracks.

xxx

Clarke wound her way through the throng of people to reach the painting she had submitted, eager to see if anyone liked it. An artist was always a little egotistical about their work, and Clarke was no different. A tall figure was standing in front of her artwork, and she sidled up to him, looking at her work.

"Beautiful, isn't it?" A familiar deep voice sounded, and Clarke looked up to see none other than the tanned face of the history buff Bellamy gazing at her painting.

"Thanks," she said, and he looked down, surprise playing over his features.

His eyes lit up with recognition, and he smirked in greeting.

"Hello again, Clarke." his voice was as charming as she remembered. "How is your head?"

Clarke pretended to cradle her head where she had been attacked by a display of roman sword

fighting, wincing unexpectedly as she touched a sensitive patch of skin.

"I think I have a concussion," she jested, and watched as Bellamy's dark eyes widened with concern, reminiscent of a puppy dog.

"Oh my briskets, I'm so sorry!"

Clarke laughed at his reaction, and the random censorship of his words. She dropped the act, extending her hand in greeting.

"I'm fine, Bellamy," she told him, and a scowl marred his face as Bellamy realised she had only been joking. (Although she did notice the relief that followed his embarrassment)

Clarke let out another chortle, her diaphragm getting the biggest workout it had had in some time, and the scowl slowly dropped off his face.

"Soo..." Bellamy drawled, and Clarke noticed for the first time a slight accent lacing his words, foreign to her ears. "Does this artwork have an audio tour?"

Clarke crinkled her brow, not understanding the random question, because of course it didn't. She opened her mouth to respond but Bellamy was already continuing.

"Because I'd like to hear all about you," Clarke found a smile creeping across her face at his lame pick up line, looking up at him as he smirked down at her. (Bellamy would admit later that when he discovered Clarke was an artist he looked up all art related pick up lines he could find)

Clarke's own pick up line inventory was limited, but she had a few to continue the art theme.

"Are you looking you a new job?" This time it was Bellamy who was confused.

"Because I'm looking for a nude model." A blush started to stain his cheeks as he wholeheartedly agreed with her proposition.

The conversation lulled, and Clarke found herself unable to maintain eye contact with his chocolate eyes, else her own eyes drifted down, to admire his sculpted nose, his smooth lips, the way muscles made themselves known under his tight shirt every time he moved….

"Clarke?" Clarke shook herself out of the Bellamy induced haze and found Bellamy ooking at her with questioning eyes.

"Huh?"

"I said, would you like to get coffee with me sometime?"

Clarke most definitely would.

xxx

Raven watched as Clarke and Bellamy laughed together, and couldn't think about the last time someone had made her best friend make that gleeful sound. Before the time of Lexa, definitely.

Her friends giggle had been locked up for a while, frozen in her throat by the heartless people who had broken Clarke.

She decided to leave them alone and went to go but coffee, glancing one more time at the smiling Clarke, and hoping the grin wouldn't disappear again.

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 **It's a little shorter than the last chap, sorry about that. I wanted to get it up asap. I don't know whether this is the final chapter - I guess that's up to you guys. Thankyou all who have been reading :)**

 **Find me on tumblr - hazmatilda**

 **Bye :)**


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